


Gravity and Time

by AidaRonan



Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: Amputee Bucky Barnes, Beach Sex, Blow Jobs, First Meetings, Hand Jobs, M/M, Meet-Cute, Nomad Steve Rogers, Older Characters, Science Nerd Bucky Barnes, Snakes, Tent Sex, Translation available (Russian), War Veteran Bucky Barnes, very brief non-graphic mention of the events of 9/11, very light D/s undertones, Перевод на русский | Translation in Russian
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-27
Updated: 2020-02-27
Packaged: 2021-02-28 05:00:17
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,068
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22918099
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AidaRonan/pseuds/AidaRonan
Summary: On the eve of his 115th birthday, Steve decides to camp on the beach. It's meant to be a break from always traveling and always fighting. A respite. A breath.And then a gorgeous man with gray-blue eyes mows him over, and Steve is faced with the best possible birthday present the universe could've given him.Featuring Frisbee, banter, shared life experiences, an older Steve with a few lines and wrinkles, an older Bucky with a touch of gray, and so many mentions of the sounds of the ocean that this basically counts as a white noise playlist.
Relationships: Brief interlude between Steve and OFC, James "Bucky" Barnes/Steve Rogers
Comments: 91
Kudos: 681
Collections: Marvel Trumps Hate 2019





	Gravity and Time

**Author's Note:**

  * For [BookGeekGrrl](https://archiveofourown.org/users/BookGeekGrrl/gifts).



> This story is a gift for BookGeekGrrl who participated in Marvel Trumps Hate.
> 
> Translation in русский [ here ](https://ficbook.net/readfic/9395983/24089487) with many thanks to CroireZandars + Umbrella and Company!

On July 3rd of 2033, Steve Rogers looks into the dingy mirror of a motel somewhere in Southern Louisiana. He’s turning 115 tomorrow in calendar years, and he’s nearing 50 when he counts his time out of the ice. He’s starting to look it too. According to the doctor he sees once in a blue moon, internally, Steve is still twenty-something, his organs functioning at levels that even some teenagers don’t achieve. His face though…

Steve pokes at one of the small wrinkles off the corner of his mouth, nearly hidden by his honey-bronze beard. Then he smooths out the tiny lines at the edges of his eyes.

He remembers back fifteen or so years ago, before his falling out with Tony and the entire US government, to Bruce in a post-mission debrief saying simply, “Gravity and time are some of the most powerful forces on Earth.”

Even the serum can’t fight them apparently. Steve smiles softly at the small canyons creasing the skin of his forehead, then smiles wider at the way his skin wrinkles up more upon movement, showing every year he once thought he’d never get.

Outside of the bathroom, there’s a woman in his motel bed, snoring in soft puffs. He doesn’t know her, not really. He’d run into her at a restaurant and bar where he’d been attempting to catch up on calories after a rough mission down the coast. She’d kicked Steve’s ass in darts, then pretty bluntly said she wanted to go home with him, so there she is, fast asleep while the first rays of morning creep in through the windows.

He leaves her to go find the continental breakfast and picks up an extra coffee and a plate full of pastries and fruit. She’s awake by the time he gets back, the sheets tucked up under her arms.

“God, honey, you’re a saint among one night stands,” she says, taking the coffee from his hand and dumping in a couple packs of sugar.

She’s gone within the hour. No phone number, not even a hint that she wants Steve to ask for more.

He’s good with that. He’s good with being alone.

He kind of has to be in his line of work, always on the move looking for the places where he’s needed, avoiding the people who would stop him from finding them for one reason or another.

Check out is at eleven, but Steve’s packed up and on his bike by nine, speeding along the coast toward the Texas border. He might camp on the beach somewhere tonight, tucked up near the dunes where the sea breeze will push most of the July heat away. He keeps a backpacking tent shoved in the bottom of his pack for when the safest harbor he can find is somewhere far from civilization.

Or for when it’s the eve of his 115th birthday and he wants to be somewhere nice and calm. A respite for a weary nomad.

By noon, the plan is cemented, and he finds Sea Rim State Park not long after he crosses the state line. He has to park his bike off the beach and trek his things over, but that’s easy enough with everything he owns neatly packed into an olive green surplus rucksack.

The tent goes up in seconds, the green and tan silnylon flapping in the wind off the surf. Steve doesn’t have a chair, so he combs the beach for a large enough piece of driftwood and drags it back to his campsite. Then he takes off his shoes, changes into a pair of simple cotton shorts in his tent, and walks up and down the shore, letting his feet dip in and out of the water, picking up the occasional interesting seashell.

Maybe he’ll send Natasha a care package of shells and beach glass before he moves on. He hasn’t checked in since April or so.

He puts a lovely little spiral shell in his pocket as a start and stands in the sand, closing his eyes and focusing on the sensation of the water washing the ground out from beneath him. He’s ankle-deep when the body collides with him, sending him toppling awkwardly onto his knees and side.

Steve had heard them coming from several feet away even over the waves and wind, but he’d figured it was just someone running down the beach, hadn’t even opened his eyes.

A mistake.

His brain immediately kicks into bullet time, thinking through his first move. If it’s just one guy, he’ll take care of it, but it’s never just one guy. Disable the nearest attacker then, and run before the others swarm. He hopes he can swing back by his campsite to grab his bag at least—he’ll have to leave the tent behind though, no time to pull the stakes.

Win some, lose some.

Out of the sand, onto his feet—ignore the twinge in his joints that’ll be gone within the minute—fists up and at the ready.

Except.

The other body’s still on the sand, cringing and dusting grit off his now-red knees. Not an attacker at all, just an accident. Steve drops his fists before the guy notices they’re poised to swing.

“Shit, sorry,” the guy says.

Steve offers his hand, helping him up, and that’s when he notices that, well, the other guy’s kind of…

He’s, well, really fucking attractive is the thing. He’s in plain black swim shorts that go to his knees—moderately thin, but his belly’s soft, and there’s dark hair all over his chest and down his middle. One of his arms is a prosthetic covered in a sleeve of flesh-toned silicone with some scarring near his shoulder. If Steve had to guess, he’s close to Steve’s technical age. There are strong laugh lines around his eyes, a few spare streaks of gray through the dark bun curled at the nape of his neck, and flecks of salt and pepper in his beard.

Steve wants to throw him over his shoulder and drag him back to his little tent, to taste the ocean on his skin and feel the grit of sand between their bodies.

Jesus, Steve, you literally got laid yesterday.

Yeah, but it’s my _birthday_ , Steve replies to the voice in his head.

“Don’t worry about it,” Steve says, giving the guy a good pull up off the sand where he dusts off more.

“It’s the new arm. My old one was heavier, so I’ve gotta figure out my center of gravity all over again.” The man bends over to pick up a bright blue Frisbee, tapping it against his shorts to dust it off.

He’s got nice legs, Steve notes. They’d be even nicer wrapped around Steve’s hips or even Steve’s head. Beyond the legs though, the guy’s got an accent so familiar that Steve can almost smell his mother’s cooking, can almost hear the street cars squealing along their tracks outside.

Of course, this guy won’t know either one of those things, but home is home no matter how much it changes.

“I’m Steve.” Steve offers him his hand again, coupling it with the most charming smile he can get his mouth to make after so many years of untethered life on the road. “Brooklyn?”

The guy’s face cracks into a wide grin, his gorgeous gray-blue eyes sparkling with it.

“Born and raised, pal.”

“Yeah, me too.”

An even wider smile, a firm handshake.

“James, but my friends call me Bucky,” he says, “and if you’re from Brooklyn, then you definitely count.”

Bucky. There’s something so classic about the nickname ‘Bucky’ that Steve can almost forget what year it is, especially out here on the beach where the world seems so soft and timeless. How many guys had he known who went by Bucky before and during the war?

This is his very first Bucky in the 21st century, and oh what a Bucky he is.

“What brings you all the way down here?” Steve asks. Because he knows what he’s doing and why, but he can’t fathom another boy from Brooklyn somehow finding his way to the Texas coast without a good reason.

“I work in coastal conservation,” Bucky says, and okay, hot. “But we’re here for fun right now. Long weekend and all that.”

“We?”

“Some folks from work,” Bucky says. “That’s Amy and DJ back there looking like they might murder me if I don’t throw this Frisbee back right now.” He turns and gives it an expert flip down the beach, then puts both hands on his hips while he watches it fly. “It’s nice to be outside sometimes without it being all about work, you know, though we’ve definitely hauled out a few bags of washed up trash already. Can’t help it.”

“That’s not work. That’s just polite.”

Bucky laughs. “Exactly. And what about you? What could possibly make anyone leave Brooklyn if they don’t gotta?” He puts his hand over his eyes to shade them from the sun, looking at Steve through squinted lids.

“Passing through on business and needed a break. Saw the sign, had my tent.”

“And here you are, a solid brick wall for unsuspecting Frisbee players to mow down on the beach.”

“If I was solid, you wouldn’t have been able to mow me down.”

“Felt pretty fucking solid to me.” Bucky smirks.

And _oh,_ it really is Steve’s birthday, isn’t it?

He looks Bucky over and is very, very obvious about it. When he meets Bucky’s eyes, there’s a flash of heat, of interest, and then one of his friends calls his name.

“I should…” Bucky gestures toward the Black woman waving the Frisbee in the air.

“I’m in the camo tent down that way,” Steve says. “If you make it down there, I’d love the company.”

At that, it’s Bucky’s turn to drink Steve in from head to toe.  
  
“Duly noted, Steve.” And then he’s off, running barefoot down the sand to catch the Frisbee where it glides through the salty air.

* * *

A little before dusk, Steve moseys his way back down the beach toward his campsite, collecting driftwood along the way.

Back at his campsite, he digs out his folding shovel and uses it to make a good-sized pit in the sand, piling up the displaced dirt to help block the wind and stacking his found wood down in the hole. He keeps homemade fire starter on him too, a little plastic jar of cotton balls soaked in Vaseline. They make getting a fire going easy, and once the flames have fully caught, he fills a titanium mug with water and sets it at the edge, planning on having one of the backpacking meals in his pack for dinner.

“Hey again.”

Steve looks up at the voice. He’d been hopeful when he heard the footsteps approaching, had still been a little on edge for a fight too just in case.

But hope wins out today—and it’s always good to have a reminder that if you tally up the good and the bad in the world, hope wins more often than not, no matter how much it sometimes feels like the opposite.  
  
In front of him, Bucky’s face glows orange-gold in the firelight, the last rays of indigo dusk framing him from behind.

He’s got his hair down now. In this light, Steve can’t make out any of the gray in it, but he can see the way it falls in salt-aided waves down to Bucky’s shoulders, where he’s now clad in a simple gray tee with white letters spelling out “Save the h*ckin Earth.”

Steve pushes his fingers back through his own hair, a few inches long and holding its shape easily out here. In his periphery, the wind blows a few strands this way and that, the firelight picking up coppers and golds within them.  
  
“I was hoping you’d have a campfire going,” Bucky says.

“Were you?” Steve glances down at it and then back at Bucky, who holds up a canvas tote.

“I brought dinner if you haven’t eaten.”

“Not yet.” Steve pats the long piece of driftwood next to him, and Bucky takes a seat, putting the bag down on the ground between them. “And I’m betting whatever’s in that bag is better than what I had planned.”

“Let’s find out.”

It’s a little rough, trying to get everything going while fighting the breeze, but they get camp plates into their laps, and Bucky pulls out sausage and fresh baked Hawaiian buns, plus a little bottle of mustard.  
  
He’s got telescoping metal skewers as well, and they use them to spear their sausages and roast them over the flames. One by one, they pass buns and mustard between them, making each sausage dog as they go along until the lot of it is gone.

“That’s not your whole food supply for the weekend, is it?”

“Not at all. Besides, look at the size of you,” Bucky says. “I kinda knew you’d be able to put it away.”

“Careful. A fella might think you’re flirting when you talk like that.”

Bucky knocks his knee against Steve’s. “I should hope so.”

Then there are s’mores, their hands sticky with melted sugar by the time they finish.  
  
For a while after that, they sit on the driftwood and watch the fire, occasionally talking, occasionally flirting. Bucky asks where in Brooklyn Steve’s from, and Steve goes into his neighborhood as vaguely as he can, smiling when he describes his Ma and their building full of immigrants and single mothers. Then he talks about sharing an apartment with five other artists before he enlisted, leaving out which war it was and that the apartment was actually a tenement that barely contained them all at once.

“You too, huh?” Bucky asks when Steve gets to joining the Army.

“Oh, were you in the military?”

“Yeah.” And Bucky goes quiet for several beats.

“Turned eighteen in 2002. They weren’t even done with clean-up yet, you know?” Bucky pushes his toes into the sand, making little pits, then covering them over like they were never there. “We all thought we were doing something important until we realized we weren’t. Or at least that’s how it went with my unit. I guess some folks still think they’re doing something important even now. Maybe they keep believing it because it’s too hard not to, or maybe they’ve got fucked up views of what important means. I just know I had no goddamned business there, that _we_ had no goddamned business there.” Bucky looks up, out at the waves where the white caps are just barely catching the moonlight. “Sorry, probably didn’t wanna swap old war stories tonight.”

“It’s okay,” Steve says. “I’m pissed about it all too. About a lot of things.”

And he is. Steve had worn those colors back during the war, had worn them again in New York and thought he’d known why. And it’s not like he doesn’t believe in what they stand for even now, that he’s not still fighting for the ideals behind them because he holds those very ideals in his blood, feels them coursing through the marrow of his bones.

He just doesn’t particularly believe in what those colors have been co-opted for since the day they were born, and that’s the real rub of it, huh?

“Can I ask…”

“If that’s what happened to my arm?” Bucky shakes his head. “Just an accident about ten years ago. I was way out by then and already trying to get into this. Do some good in the world after feeling like I was used to do a lot of bad.”  
  
Steve hums, then lets the sound of the surf soothe some of the shared ache between them in ways that talking just can’t.

“So what exactly do you do?” Steve finally asks. “Save the hecking Earth, I’m guessing?”

Bucky huffs out a laugh that’s more air than sound, and some of the tension in his shoulders softens and melts.

“It’s kinda nerdy.”

“Nothing sexier than that,” Steve says, and Bucky grins and looks down at his feet.

“I’m a molecular biologist with some pathobiology thrown in,” Bucky says. “So if there’s seaweed or algae or coral that is either sick or maybe even doing too well, I try to figure out why and work with some other people to help get things back to normal the best we can..”

“I don’t guess I knew there were coral reefs in the gulf.”

“Yeah, Flower Garden Banks. It’s about 100 miles off the coast from where we launch. It was struggling, and I guess still is, but it’s doing better.”

“Thanks to you.”

“If you mean the collective ‘you,’ as in the entire Southern Gulf Coast Conservation Corps, then sure,” Bucky says. “Me, I’m just one guy.”

“All any of us can be.” Steve nudges Bucky’s knee with his own, but doesn’t draw it away, letting their legs rest together.

“Yeah.”  
  
It falls quiet again at least as far as conversation goes, and Steve’s working up to asking Bucky into his tent, the warmth of his leg making Steve want even more contact.  
  
Is he simple about it—an invitation—do you want to come in? Is he filthy about it? Does he tell Bucky he wants to taste him from head to cock? Does he try to kiss him first and let things naturally move from beside the dwindling campfire to somewhere passersby can’t easily see?  
  
Then Steve feels silicone gently brush across his knuckles before weaving through his fingertips. Steve knows some of the newer prosthetics that came out in the past decade have synaptic feedback and can feel and sense pressure, sometimes more than a natural appendage can to the point that it can be overwhelming for a user, especially with a newer device. When he softly squeezes Bucky’s hand, Bucky’s eyes flutter closed.

“Is that too much?” Steve asks.

“No,” Bucky says hoarsely.

Come inside.

Steve feels the words forming on his lips.

“I’m supposed to go night hiking with everyone,” Bucky mumbles, his eyes still closed, his breath coming out heavier and heavier while Steve draws shapes on his palm. “You wanna come?”

Pal, you got no idea.

“Yeah,” Steve says. “Yeah, I’d like that.”

They bury the rest of the fire and Steve grabs his boots and a flashlight from inside his tent, carrying them down the beach where they eventually reach Bucky’s campsite. The two women from earlier are there. The Black woman’s name is DJ, her hair in twin braids that are rolled into buns a bit like a space princess. Amy is a thin, wiry white woman with dull brown hair and more energy than a newborn husky. There are others too—DJ’s wife Rashmi just along for the holiday, another molecular biologist named Marco, Jeanette and Rosita who are both coastal stewards, and Dee the Intern.

They all trek to the nearest path through the dunes, headlamps and flashlights bouncing to and fro. Off the beach, they sit at day use picnic tables and dust their feet off, socks and shoes going on so they can walk down the asphalt roads to the entrance of the Gambusia Nature Trail.

It’s an interesting experience for Steve. He’s been on hikes before, sometimes out of necessity, sometimes just to clear his head. But he’s never been on hikes with a bunch of people whose jobs revolve around a particular environment.

“If you look to your left,” DJ says, “there are some tracks in the mud.”  
  
Steve shines his flashlight over, and sure enough there are some pretty deep tracks crossing a pit of mostly-dry marsh.  
  
“Wild boar,” Bucky mutters for Steve’s ears only. Up ahead, DJ announces the same thing. Steve never in a million years would’ve guessed that there were wild boar on the coast. “Alligator too,” Bucky says, tilting his head so that the beam from his headlamp illuminates another set of tracks leading off into the grass.

Pretty much all of the trail is on a boardwalk, and soon the mud gives way to actual marsh, the water dark and murky on either side of the walkway.  
  
“Sure as hell don’t wanna fall in,” Marco mumbles, and Steve’s inclined to agree. Sometimes just knowing you’d live through a thing doesn’t mean you’d want to experience it. Nearly everywhere he shines his flashlight, he can see fish and crabs and snakes. So many snakes.

“Nerodia clarkii clarkii,” Bucky says low, taking Steve’s hand to aim his flashlight at a snake with distinct vertical stripes hiding among plants and fish. “AKA the Gulf Salt Marsh Snake. Not venomous. A fun fact about these little guys is that they don’t drink any water. They get all their water intake from prey.”

Ahead of them, the group continues to move slowly down the boardwalk, their voices getting fainter as they go. Steve doesn’t move, Bucky’s hand still wrapped around his, his body half-pressed against Steve’s back. Bucky moves his hand again, using it to guide the flashlight along the water. A few things scatter in the beam, but other things don’t.  
  
“Callinectus sapidus. Blue crab,” Bucky says, letting his chin rest on Steve’s shoulder. “They can get up to two pounds fully grown. That one right there’s a lady. You can tell by the shape of her, but also the red on her claws.” Another shift, Bucky’s fingers softly encouraging Steve to tip his hand. “And that one’s a fella. See the difference?”  
  
Steve breathes, in and out, his whole body humming with want. He’d turn and kiss Bucky right now if the boardwalk didn’t feel so rickety, if he wasn’t at least a hair afraid that he’d overshoot it and send them both tumbling into the marsh with the crabs and snakes—venomous or not.

Bucky moves his hand again, focusing on a clump of grass this time.  
  
“Scirpus maritimus. Saltmarsh bulrush,” Bucky says, and his lips brush the shell of Steve’s ear before pressing the lightest kiss behind it. “C’mon, big guy.”  
  
They keep walking, carefully moving down the trail. Every now and then Bucky points out another plant or a new species of crab, all the way until they reach the end of the boardwalk and step onto the sandy path that leads back to the road.  
  
The rest of the group is waiting there for them to catch up, Amy pulling Bucky aside, bouncing on the balls of her feet while they talk far enough away that Steve’s not supposed to be listening in. Which means Steve has to press his lips together double hard to keep from laughing at the rapid-fire conversation about plants, and did Bucky see the glasswort? Did he _see_ the glasswort, did he really really see it? Has he ever eaten glasswort? Was it good?  
  
Finally, Amy finishes up the conversation, and Bucky drifts back to Steve’s side. There’s talk among the group of cracking open the cooler and having a few before they turn in. When they make it back to the day use area, shoes come back off, and they all make their way back down the path to the beach in one scattered group.  
  
Sure enough, the cooler does come out before they’ve even all fully reached camp, Amy handing out drinks like she’d been elected team bartender along the way. When she holds one out for Bucky, he shakes his head.

“I think I’m gonna walk Steve home actually,” Bucky says, which gets him one raise of a thin eyebrow but nothing else from the group, and the two of them set off down the beach, the noise of the little party fading out behind them as they go.  
  
Somewhere along the way, Bucky reaches over and quietly takes Steve’s hand.  
  
Back at the tent, they sink down onto the driftwood like they’d never left. It’s dark now without the fire going, but the moon is almost half-full, and it’s enough once their eyes adjust. Steve can make out the shape of Bucky’s face, the slope of his nose, the outline of his hair. Steve reaches out to touch it, the texture thick and rough from the salt.  
  
From there, it’s easy to pull Bucky forward, to press their mouths together and fall into a gentle rhythm of lips gliding against lips that slowly shifts into tongues sliding against tongues.  
  
They make out like that for long enough that the moon has noticeably moved positions by the time Steve looks at it again, his fingers gently carding through Bucky’s waves when he does.

“You got the time?” Steve asks, and Bucky half-slides his phone out of his pocket, the glow temporarily killing their night vision, though it comes rushing back the moment it’s dark again.

Seventeen minutes after midnight.  
  
“Got a bed time, old man?” Bucky jokes.  
  
“Not for a long time.” Steve kisses him again briefly, or he means for it to be brief before Bucky’s fingers curl around his neck, capturing his attention again for several unwatched minutes. “It’s just that it’s my birthday,” Steve says when they finally break apart.  
  
“Your birthday?” Bucky asks. “On the Fourth of July?”

“Same day every year.”

Bucky laughs softly. “Just like…” And then in an instant, his whole body goes stiff in Steve’s arms.  
  
“Ah.” Steve lets him go with a sigh. “I figured it wouldn’t take a guy like you too long.”

“So you… you’re… Steve.”

“I am,” Steve says. “But, Bucky, I’m also the same guy you were kissing five minutes ago.”  
  
“Yeah.”  
  
“Nothing’s gotta be different. Nothing I’ve said to you has been a lie.”  
  
The words hang between them just long enough that Steve’s sure Bucky’s going to leave. And then just like that, Bucky relaxes again. Like it really can just be that easy and simple. Like Steve can just be Steve even if he’s also _that_ Steve.  
  
“Aren’t a whole bunch of people looking for you?”  
  
“What else is new?” Steve shrugs, and Bucky buries his face in his neck. And then, surprisingly, he starts to mouth at the skin there, nuzzling up under the collar of Steve’s tee shirt to get at his collarbone. And Steve can’t help it, the way the words tumble out of his mouth, full of heat and conviction. “Bucky. I want you.”

Bucky goes quiet and still again, inhales deeply.  
  
“Then we should probably go inside.”

Steve gets up off the driftwood first, offering Bucky his hand and leading him a few feet away to where the tent sits staked out in the sand. There’s no elegant, sexy way to get inside, and they both have to crawl through the vestibule onto the fleece blanket Steve has spread over the tent floor.  
  
“You don’t sleep in this thing often, do you?” Bucky asks, his tone somewhat concerned.  
  
“At least a few times a month. Why?” Steve settles next to him on the blanket, takes the opportunity to push a lock of hair behind Bucky’s ear.  
  
“Before you leave Texas, I’m buying you a birthday present,” Bucky says, and then he reaches over to cup the back of Steve’s neck and pull him into a kiss. Steve takes that as a cue, slowly moving on top of Bucky, his knees resting on the ground between Bucky’s thighs to take most of his weight.  
  
Steve groans into Bucky’s mouth before registering why, Bucky rolling his hips up beneath him. Steve’s hard, has been hard since Bucky put his mouth on his neck, and now Steve can feel Bucky’s length against his, stiff and full.  
  
“Fuck, that feels good,” Bucky sighs, both hands gripping Steve’s biceps tightly.  
  
“Would feel even better if there wasn’t so much between us.”  
  
But even saying it, Steve doesn’t move to pull them out of their shorts just yet, opting instead for lowering his face to Bucky’s to lick into his mouth. Around them, the tent whips noisily in the wind. Farther away, the ocean waves are a constant ebb and flow of _kssh-schh,_ _kssh-schh_. Inside, Steve can hear the steady friction of them moving, can hear the sounds of tongues slicking together, of flesh and silicone touching here, touching there.  
  
Bucky moans as pretty as he looks, his lips vibrating against Steve’s. And Steve swears he can hear the rumble of it in his own chest. He rocks his hips a little faster, Bucky moving his hands to Steve’s ass, encouraging him to move quicker, to lean into the pressure.  
  
Steve’s lips slip from Bucky’s mouth and burn through his beard, finding his earlobe and sucking before giving it a nip with hungry teeth.  
  
“Steve,” Bucky pants, and finally the thin layers of fabric between them have started to feel like insurmountable chasms. Steve plants one more kiss on the smile lines of Bucky’s cheek and sits up on his knees, his head brushing the roof of the tent.  
  
He starts on Bucky’s swim shorts first, finding and loosening the draw strings inside before ripping open the velcro. There’s no underwear to contend with, and it’s easy for Steve to wiggle the shorts off Bucky’s hips. It’s a little harder to get them all the way off though, and they both laugh quietly while Bucky tries to kick one foot free, managing to catch Steve in the stomach along the way.

“It’s like all I’ve done today is hurt you,” Bucky jokes, with Steve holding onto his bare foot. But they get there, Bucky tugging his own shirt off.  
  
And then Bucky’s naked in front of Steve, the world too dark to see anything but the shape of him spread across Steve’s pallet of a bed.  
  
“Can I look at you?” Steve asks, holding up his flashlight. “Just for a second.”

“Can we look together?”  
  
That seems more than fair, and Steve reaches behind his head and grabs hold of his tee, whipping it off and dropping it on top of Bucky’s shorts. He knows his own shorts aren’t gonna come off without a fight he’s not into having, so Steve slips his thumbs into the waist band and slides both his shorts and his underwear down onto his hips and thighs. It’s enough to free his cock, enough to bare his ass if anyone could see it. At least Bucky will be able to get his hands on it to squeeze and tug Steve along.

“Just for a second,” Steve reiterates. “Light from inside makes the tent pretty see-through.”  
  
“Okay.”  
  
Steve clicks the flashlight on. And there’s Bucky, his face flushed and his dark hair fanned out around him, a few streaks of gray catching the light. Steve reaches down to run his fingertips along Bucky’s chest and belly, following the fuzzy line that leads down to his cock, hard and nestled in a bed of curls. Bucky’s dick is a pretty, perfect mouthful, flushed just a little pink at the tip. Steve licks his palm and gives it a good stroke or two, just so he can see what Bucky’s face does when something feels good. You know, for reference.  
  
“Your eyelids flutter so pretty, Bucky,” Steve says. “That feel good?”  
  
“Yeah, Steve.” Bucky leans up, reaches out with his right hand to trace through Steve’s own tufts of dark bronze chest and body hair. Down his fingers go, down and down and down. And then they’re both gripping each other firmly, jerking slowly in the flashlight beam just to watch each other react.  
  
“Should probably turn it off now,” Steve says, because the last thing he wants is for someone to see something they didn’t bargain for.  
  
“Just one more minute.” Bucky’s breathing heavy. “Just wanna see one thing.”  
  
He gently pushes Steve’s hand away from his cock, then guides their erections together, his breath catching when they collide. Steve lets out his own broken sighs when Bucky wraps his hand around them both before rocking his hips up, his hard length sliding up and down Steve’s. A low grown from Steve, and he grabs hold of where they’re joined, making it a more solid union and giving them more space to fuck into.  
  
“God, that’s…” Steve trails off, watching his cock slide against Bucky’s, watching the heads of both their erections peek out of the tops of their hands.  
  
“Okay,” Bucky whispers, and Steve kills the light, but they both keep moving, Steve shutting his eyes to hold onto the image of it, to the way Bucky’s face goes soft and lax with pleasure then hard with concentration, then soft again.  
  
It goes on like that for a while, both of them moving into the tunnel made by palms and fingers. And then Steve manages to form a coherent thought that he holds onto long enough to speak.  
  
“Bucky, I wanna suck you.”

Bucky groans quietly, then falls back onto the blanket, his hands resting down at his sides.  
  
“Guessing that’s okay,” Steve teases.  
  
“Yeah, Steve, please.”  
  
Steve doesn’t go right to it, choosing instead to nuzzle into Bucky’s chest hair and down his body, finding bits of skin to lick, to nip, to suck and mark up. The last thing he does is leave a several hickeys on Bucky’s hips and torso below the waist. Bucky will still be able to run shirtless down the beach, but hidden away beneath his swim shorts, there will be so many signs that Steve has been there, that he’s had him and loved every second of it.  
  
Finally, the heady smell of Bucky’s arousal hits him, and Steve finds Bucky’s cock with his hand first, holding it steady so that he can easily run his tongue along the shaft and up over the head. He does this for a minute or two, just tasting and exploring until Bucky huffs in frustration.  
  
“Steve.”  
  
With a low chuckle, Steve wets his lips and starts slide them over the head of Bucky’s cock. Even with the noise of wind and ocean, Bucky’s deep breaths seem to fill up the tent, worming their way into Steve’s ears before settling hot and deep in his belly. And Christ, when was the last time Steve wanted someone so much? Got so hot for someone that he took his time like this? That he let the lust bubble and boil beneath his skin until he felt like he was going to combust with it.  
  
In his mouth, Bucky feels heavy, and Steve keeps letting his cock slide in, deeper and deeper until he can feel it press against the back of his throat, Bucky swearing softly, both of his hands tangling in Steve’s hair.  
  
The silicone sleeve catches a little and pulls, but Steve finds he kind of likes that. He sure doesn’t move to stop it from happening, choosing instead to swallow around the intrusion in his mouth, to make Bucky swear again, his fingers tightening.  
  
Bucky’s cock slides out just as slow as it slid in, Steve finding places to put his tongue, to lick, to flick, to swirl. He can taste pre-come, salty and bitter. He takes Bucky in again, faster now, looking for a rhythm, his lips moving tight against Bucky’s shaft one way and then another.  
  
It’s not long before Bucky can barely form words, let alone get anything out that’s longer than a syllable, which, it’s probably a good thing ‘Steve’ is such an easy one to say, his name tumbling out among ‘fuck’ and ‘shit’ and ‘Christ,’ the order of these utterances never the same from one moment to the next.

It’s a point of pride for Steve to be so good at this, to know if he can get his mouth on someone, he can strip everything away they are and reduce them to one whole gorgeous mess.  
  
He keeps sucking, stopping just long enough to wet a thumb that he slides down between Bucky’s cheeks, using it to gently rub at the sensitive rim of muscle in soft, deliberate circles. Beneath him, Bucky’s trembling.  
  
“Steve… Steve, if…”  
  
One of Bucky’s hands seems to be trying to shove Steve’s head away, though it’s not doing a very good job of it. At any rate, Steve stops, lets Bucky pant long enough to find his words.  
  
“Steve, if you wanna do anything else to me tonight, you might wanna give it a rest.”  
  
“What do you want?” Steve asks. Because Steve knows what he wants and that’s a very resounding ‘anything that Bucky will give him.’  
  
“Honestly?”  
  
“Honestly. Tell me what you want from me, Bucky, and you’ll get it.”  
  
“Alright,” Bucky pushes up onto his elbows, his soft stomach forming tiny rolls. “Trade me for a while. Let me see how your cock feels in my mouth and throat, how much drool I can get on your blanket.”  
  
Steve inhales sharply, his cock twitching.  
  
“Done. And then?”  
  
“Then let’s make out, just kiss and jerk each other until we finish. No rush. Just…”  
  
“Just feeling good together.” Steve smiles, even though Bucky probably can’t see it.  
  
“Yeah, Steve.” Bucky gets up onto his knees, hunching over to avoid colliding with the tent ceiling. And Steve can’t help it. With them both at relatively the same height, he has to wrap an arm around him, has to pull him in for a kiss, their erections briefly forgotten where they bump into each other’s hips.  
  
Then remembered again when their hips start to move, seeking out bare skin and friction that they both want so much.  
  
Steve pulls away first, shifting down onto his back, his shorts still pooled under his ass and around his hips and thighs. Bucky doesn’t do anything to them, straddling Steve’s legs. He gives Steve some of the same treatment Steve gave him, except he sucks a hickey right onto Steve’s pectoral, sucking and sucking until Steve’s sure he’s drawn blood.  
  
It’ll be gone by the morning, but for now it feels good to know Bucky’s left something behind.  
  
Steve closes his eyes, feels Bucky’s movements in lips brushing over the skin of his ribs, rough beard rubbing across his tummy, a whisper of hair tickling his torso all the way down.

Where Steve started out licking and teasing, there’s no preamble for Bucky at all, his lips opening and taking Steve in as deep as he can fit, his body jerking with a gag, then relaxing into it, letting Steve fill up his throat and slide in deep like the space was made for him.  
  
It feels so fucking good that Steve swears he’s slipping between dimensions, his body untethered to reality, hurtling through the whole of everything and all the spaces in between. Up and down Bucky’s mouth goes, his lips firm, his mouth wet and hot and tight and his throat all of those things too, just more.

Sex is one of the few times Steve’s breathing really gets heavy, and it’s heavy now, his chest rising and falling quickly, his gasps and pants filling up the tent along with the wet sucking noises coming from between his legs.  
  
Bucky knows what he’s doing, really _really_ fucking knows what he’s doing. And he takes a finger and presses it against Steve’s perineum, massaging and stimulating his prostate externally. When the pressure of it all starts to build, Steve can feel the groans rumbling out of his own chest, low and heavy like summer thunder.  
  
He has to stop Bucky soon, as much as he’s loving how this feels, as much as the sensation of drool running down and off his balls has him seeing colors the human eye allegedly can’t discern. Bucky had said what he wanted, and Steve wants to give him that because a pretty, perfect, smart thing like Bucky deserves anything he asks for.  
  
And because honestly, it sounded perfect. Letting time fade away and just existing with another person, reveling in soft pleasure that goes on and on.  
  
“Bucky,” Steve says tenderly, the beginning of an orgasm starting to take shape and form. He reaches for Bucky’s head, takes a handful of hair, which earns him a groan so deep that Steve can’t help but reach out with both hands, take hold tightly, and force Bucky’s face onto him a few times.  
  
And oh, Bucky is very into that. His moans vibrate against Steve’s cock every time Steve pushes him down.  
  
Another time, they’ll explore it. Another time. Steve pulls Bucky’s face away, Bucky trailing drool in his wake.  
  
“Come back up here,” Steve says quietly, and Bucky settles onto his left side with his chest pressed against Steve’s. Their foreheads touch, hands reaching into the space between them to find erections and close fingers around them.  
  
The first tugs are frantic, too frantic, but they manage to slow it down, finding each other’s mouths, the kisses like the campfire from earlier. High flames at first, licking up into the darkness before burning down to a low smolder of warm, red coals.  
  
Steve doesn’t know how long it goes, how long he moves his mouth lazily against Bucky’s, how long he lets Bucky’s cock slide through his palm and fingers, how long his own cock does the same in Bucky’s hand.  
  
When Bucky’s hip starts to ache, they move positions, Steve kneeling between his legs again, hovering above him to kiss him, their hands still moving gently between them, rolling like the waves of the ocean, the ebb and flow of eons passing slowly by.  
  
It’s good. It’s good in a way that Steve knows he only appreciates with age, when he can push away the desperate need to come and just enjoy how good the actual getting-there is.  
  
But eventually, even the scenic route gets you to the destination, and Bucky’s lips break away, press wet against Steve’s cheek and say quietly, “Stevie. I’m coming.”  
  
Stevie.  
  
Something in Steve’s chest gets knocked out of place then put back even better than it had ever sat before.  
  
“Yeah, Buck, you are.”

Bucky’s cock’s already pulsing in Steve’s hand, letting loose come that spurts onto Steve’s stomach then slides lazily across his fingertips, and all of this while Bucky whines quiet and pretty.

And then it’s Steve’s turn, Steve wrapping his hand around Bucky’s where it’s gone slack, giving a few pulls that are harder and rougher than they have been since minutes or hours or years ago, before Bucky got him in his mouth.

When Steve comes, it’s with his lips against Bucky’s neck to quiet the groan that rips out of his chest, to quiet the subsequent groans that come with every twitch of his cock.  
  
Quiet falls fast, Steve catching his breath, Bucky’s fading into slow and steady. Until it’s just the wind against the tent and the ocean dancing gently across the sand.  
  
Steve falls on his back next to Bucky, fixes his shorts, finds Bucky’s hand and weaves their fingers together. Eventually, Bucky moves to pull his own shorts back on, grabbing his tee shirt and tucking it up under his head.

And that’s how they fall asleep, side by side with their hands twined between them.  
  
In the morning, they go down to the water, rinse away the sweat and heat of the evening and kiss in the surf. They spend all day together, walking up and down the beach, dipping in when the sun gets too hot, playing Frisbee with Bucky’s work friends, building sandcastles, then enjoying shish kebabs and more s’mores and beer and sparklers once the sun goes down.  
  
Steve never wants to leave, wants to stay on the beach forever with Bucky and, occasionally, Bucky’s friends and coworkers.

He wants to stay even more when Bucky crawls into his tent again that night, when he lets Steve fuck his mouth and hold him on his cock until he has to gasp for air every time he comes up.  
  
He wants to stay even more when they fall asleep again, their hands clasped together like they had been the night before, the night air too hot for them to sleep any closer.  
  
But nothing can last forever, not even the sea, and Bucky and his work friends have to pack up and move out on the fifth, and after that, there’s really no point in Steve staying. So he helps Bucky break down his tent and pack up his truck, already dreading the parking lot good-bye, already trying to think of how he wants to breach the conversation of them staying in touch somehow.  
  
“You staying another night or…?” Bucky asks.

“No,” Steve says, “won’t be anything for me here tonight.”

“Cool. I’ll help you pack up and we’ll figure things out with the cars.”  
  
“With the cars?”

“I told you I’m getting you a birthday present before you leave Texas, Steve. I wasn’t bluffing. But Houston’s two hours away, so we might wanna figure out somewhere for you to park. Or I guess you can follow me in.”

“Oh, I guess I thought…” Steve shakes his head. “It’s a bike actually. I can lift it into the back of your truck.”

“You can lift…” Bucky blinks. “If you do that and I’m not there to see it, I’m going to make you take it down and do it again.”

“Pretty homosexual of you, Buck.”  
  
“Damn straight.”

Steve smiles.  
  
And so they break down camp. And so Bucky watches Steve hoist his motorcycle into the bed of his truck. And so they make out in the cab for several minutes that only don’t end in sex because there’s nowhere private for them to go.  
  
After, Bucky drives them into Houston and makes Steve try out every backpacking sleep pad at REI until he finds one that’s comfortable and big enough for him. They get an early barbecue dinner after that, the meal stretching on as Steve orders more sides, then dessert, then drinks he doesn’t even really want.  
  
When they’re done eating, they linger outside of Bucky’s truck in the parking lot. And, well, Steve’s nearly 50. He really does need to be an adult and use his fucking words.  
  
“I’m not ready to say good-bye to you yet,” he says, and the sigh of relief from Bucky is palpable.  
  
“So don’t. Come take a shower, wash the sand off your clothes, enjoy a few days of stability.”

“I don’t know if getting involved with me would be the best idea for your life,” Steve says, because this is also true. “The last thing I want is to put you in danger.”  
  
Bucky leans against his truck, rubbing at his beard with his hand.  
  
“Everything in life is a risk, Steve. You drive to the grocery store, you go to a movie, you take a shower. Trust me, you can get hurt anywhere, and that’s the everyday stuff. That doesn’t include climbing a mountain or diving at a coral reef for work where yeah, probably nothing will attack me, but things could still go wrong.” Bucky takes a breath. “My point is that there’s no way to go through life without taking risks, especially not if you actually wanna enjoy it at all. You just gotta decide if the risks are worth it, and I don’t know, pal, I just met you. Maybe in a week, we’ll decide it was fun and say our good-byes. But right now, Stevie, I’m feeling like if I don’t see where this goes, I’m risking a lot more than I would by watching you walk away.”  
  
Steve lets that sink in, looking Bucky in his gray-blue eyes.

And there’s nothing else to do here really than kiss him, right?

So that’s what Steve does, closing the distance between them and gently meeting Bucky’s lips.

“Okay,” Steve says. “Okay.”

* * *

Time keeps going, seasons melting into seasons, and the world doesn’t stop needing Steve just because he’s fallen in love. Or maybe Steve doesn’t stop needing to think the world needs him. Either way…

He stays on the move, keeps fighting where the fight needs to be fought.  
  
And at least once a month, whether he goes to Bucky or Bucky comes to him, they find each other. Bucky’s there when Steve finally does turn a technical 50. He’s there for 60 and 70 and so many birthdays between and after, and Steve’s there for his too.  
  
It’s worth the risk every time.

**Author's Note:**

> Sea Rim is a real place I have only been to once, so any inaccuracies are either inaccuracies in my memory or are intentional. 
> 
> The nature trail does exist and does have a lot of boardwalk, and at least when I was there, it was Snake City in the actual water. My weird fat girl fears definitely manifested in me being terrified the boardwalk would crack under my feet and leave me at the mercy of the snakes and crabs (and maybe a hungry gator I just knew was lurking somewhere nearby). I should note that it wasn't all bad though, and that there were some neat birbs. 
> 
> We did do this trail during the day, because unlike Bucky and his friends, we fear God. 
> 
> The coral reef mentioned is also real. I have never been there as I cannot SCUBA dive (yet???) and also because I didn't know it existed until I started this story, but there are whale sharks! So this Bucky has definitely swam with some pretty cool shark frens. 
> 
> If you enjoyed this, I am on the [Twitter.](https://twitter.com/BiStarBucky/status/1232116753104162816) Thanks for stopping by!


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